Recent Posts
- Illinois Attorney General Files Lawsuit Against HIV/AIDS Nonprofit
- California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger Signs Budget That Cuts $52M From HIV/AIDS Programs
- Efforts Underway In Namibia To Treat Pediatric HIV
- HIV/AIDS Education Project Targeting Pennsylvania Black Women Examined
- Also In Global Health News: Uganda Male Circumcision; Malaria Vaccine; Potential Global Fund Grant In Cambodia; PMTCT Of HIV In Botswana
Random Posts
- Program Once Reserved For Alabama Inmates With HIV/AIDS Expanded To All Inmates
- South Africa Launches HIV/AIDS Vaccine Trial
- Iran's Health Ministry Releases Figures On HIV/AIDS Cases
- Amarillo, Texas To Use State Grant For HIV Surveillance Activities
- Outstanding Minority Physicians Receive Awards Dedicated To HIV Medicine
- AIDS Vaccine Not As Effective As First Thought, Scientists Say
- Government Responds To Archer Inquiry
- CONRAD Executive Director To Give Guttmacher Lecture At Reproductive Health 2009
- GPs Key To Meeting HIV Changes And Challenges, Australian
- FDA Approves Labeling Update For REYATAZ(R) Capsules To Include 96-Week Data For Previously Untreated HIV-1 Infected Adult Patients
Prescription AIDS Drugs
Contact Us
Ancestor Of HIV In Primates May Be Surprisingly Young
May 03rd, 2009
The ancestors of the simian immunodeficiency viruses (SIVs) that jumped
from chimpanzees and monkeys, and ignited the HIV/AIDS pandemic in humans,
have been dated to just a few centuries ago. These ages are substantially
younger than previous estimates, according to a new study from The
University of Arizona in Tucson, published May 1st in the open-access
journal PLoS Computational Biology.
SIV has crossed over from chimpanzees and sooty mangabeys to humans at
least eleven times, giving rise to several HIV lineages. Although HIV is a
virulent pathogen in humans, SIV rarely causes disease in these species or
the dozens of other African primate species it naturally infects. That
these non-human primates typically remain unaffected after virus exposure
has led to the hypothesis that there had been millions of years of
coevolution between SIVs and their primate hosts.
The researchers, Joel Wertheim and Dr. Michael Worobey, estimated a rate
of virus evolution using viral genetic sequences that had been isolated
from
infected humans, chimpanzees, and sooty mangabeys between 1975 and 2005.
They inferred that the viruses currently circulating in sooty mangabeys
and
in chimpanzees evolved from ancestors dating to 1809 (1729-1875) and 1492
(1266-1685), respectively. Surprisingly, the independently estimated
‘molecular clock’ of the monkey viruses was virtually identical to the
famously swift rate at which mutations accumulate in HIV genomes.
The authors note that unaccounted-for biases could be masking a deeper age
of SIV. They suggest that if these biases do exist, their causes need to
be
investigated because they might also affect the ability to properly
estimate the age of HIV and other viruses.
Citation:
Wertheim JO, Worobey M (2009)
“Dating the Age of the SIV Lineages That Gave Rise to HIV-1 and HIV-2.”
PLoS Comput Biol 5(5): e1000377.
doi:10.1371/journal.pcbi.1000377
Related posts:
- Why Some Monkeys Don’t Get AIDS Two studies published this month in the Journal of Clinical...
- Monkey Control Of SIV Infection Provides Insight Into HIV IV is a virus related to HIV that can infect...
- Researchers Develop Vaccine Candidate That Is Successful In Blocking Simian Version Of HIV Researchers have successfully blocked SIV, the simian version of HIV,...
- Young People At High HIV Risk Say Peers Should Teach Prevention African-American adolescents have some of the highest rates of HIV...
- Why Circumcision Reduces HIV Risk The decreased risk of HIV infection in circumcised men cannot...
Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.
No Comments »
No comments yet.
RSS feed for comments on this post. TrackBack URL
Leave a comment
You must be logged in to post a comment.